lf-past
seven, and had paid a shilling extra to the cabman to drive him quick.
The man, having a lame horse, had come very slowly, fidgeting Mr. Grey
into additional temporary discomfort. He had got his additional
shilling, and Mr. Grey had only additional discomfort. "I declare I
think he is the wickedest old man the world ever produced." This he said
as Dolly followed him upstairs; but Dolly, wiser than her father, would
say nothing about the wicked old man in the servants' hearing.

In five minutes Mr. Grey came down "dressed,"--by the use of which word
was implied the fact that he had shaken his neckcloth, washed his hands
and face, and put on his slippers. It was understood in the household
that, though half-past six was the hour named for dinner, half-past
seven was a much more probable time. Mr. Grey pertinaciously refused to
have it changed.

"Stare super vias antiquas," he had stoutly said when the proposition
had been made to him; by which he had intended to imply that, as during
the last twenty years he had been compelled to dine at half-past six
instead of six, he did not mean to be driven any farther in the same
direction. Consequently his cook was compelled to prepare his dinner in
such a manner that it might be eaten at one hour or the other, as chance
would have it.

The dinner passed without much conversation other than incidental to
Mr. Grey's wants and comforts. His daughter knew that he had been at the
office for eight hours, and knew also that he was not a young man. Every
kind of little cosseting was, therefore, applied to him. There was a
pheasant for dinner, and it was essentially necessary, in Dolly's
opinion, that he should have first the wing, quite hot, and then the
leg, also hot, and that the bread-sauce should be quite hot on the two
occasions. For herself, if she had had an old crow for dinner it would
have been the same thing. Tea and bread-and-butter were her luxuries,
and her tea and bread-and-butter had been enjoyed three hours ago. "I
declare I think that, after all, the leg is the better joint of the
two."

"Then why don't you have the two legs?"

"There would be a savor of greediness in that, though I know that the
leg will go down,--and I shouldn't then be able to draw the comparison. I
like to have them both, and I like always to be able to assert my
opinion that the leg is the better joint. Now, how about the
apple-pudding? You said I should have an apple-pudding." From whi